The Savage Wife
by sad little tiger
Summary: It is one thing to take a wife; it is another to love her. AU.


_Extreme AU._

* * *

The black car pulled up to the curb.

A. Wesker stepped out, graceful and hard against the hazy sunset wash.

A nod and the driver left to park in the underground.

Bulbs flashed around him – the dam of paparazzi bursting.

He smiled amiably, stood for a few shots, his hands in his pockets.

He bubbled _good evening_s and _thank you_s as they clamored for his attention, for his words, for his likeness to fill their rumor rags.

They shouted questions at him, half-expecting to be ignored, half-begging to be noticed:

"… _stance on Amendment 36?"_

"_Do you plan to… for Unit 2?"_

"_What are you having tonight?"_

"_Leaning on the conservative side… campaign?"_

"_Your support of Act 17… would you… again?"_

He nodded and smiled, signed things that were handed to him, and then nodded and smiled some more; shook their hands vigorously, thanked them even more vigorously.

He looked right into every pair of eyes, looked right into the very soul of The New America.

And The New America swooned in return.

He was in the prime of his life - forty-two, celebrated in both the public and governmental sectors, carving out a road all his own.

A. Wesker was on fire and they came from every corner to bask in his heat.

* * *

Restaurant managers appeared – ready to usher him in. They held up their impotent hands to the collective crowd. They told them the show was over, that their idol needed sustenance at this fine establishment and would they please mention the name and address of this fine establishment and to please bring their family and friends to this fine establishment at a later date.

Above the roar… one question in particular fell loudly on Wesker's ears as he was rushed past.

"_What happened to Wife Seven?"_

His polished politically correct smile was dropped.

Things became a blur then – it melted away, and all he knew was that he was being pushed and shoved by the mealy restaurant managers into their fine establishment.

_What happened to Wife Seven…_

_What happened to Wife Six…_

_What happened to Wife Five, and Four, and Three…_

His marital relations were the only stain on his impeccable life.

And it sullied his path everywhere he went.

* * *

In the marble lobby, away from the prying and that nagging sensation of _something_, the workers and waiters and sous-chefs bustled about him while he checked his Communitech.

A text from W. Birkin:

_Get seated. Running late. Be ready to discuss the Exoragen/Testimonex Bill._

He smiled despite the foul tone of the message.

It wasn't just any Senator Rank 10 that would let his assistant speak to him in such a way.

Wesker liked to think that they were a different breed though.

* * *

"Your table, sir." The maître'd fluttered the napkin.

The dining room was gilded and heavy and thick with money.

A piano player poured out a lazy rendition of Debussy's _Clair de Lune_ from the stage.

Wesker took a seat and let the host drape his lap. "Thank you."

"We have an interesting Chef's Signature tonight – pork-fed capybara in a light duck broth."

Wesker chewed his lip.

"There's also our exotic house special: coyote filet au jus."

He sighed and stared at the tiny placard menu.

No list prices.

White table cloth.

Seven utensils on either side of a gold-leaf hors d'oeuvre saucer.

Yes, this would be going on the government's tab.

"I'll take the roast suckling. My guest will have the same, thank you."

* * *

Wesker sipped the warm milk, glancing over his shoulder at the hallway – maroon velvet curtains tied up over an arched doorway.

A few waiters charged back and forth through it – but no Birkin.

He was nearly fifteen damned minutes late.

A sign hung awkwardly between two Baroque paintings.

_No unaccompanied females._

Another sip from the milk cup.

"Hades's Hell – the parking here is atrocious!" Birkin pulled out the chair next him, a nervous host looking on and wringing his hands.

Wesker waved the gathering staff off. "It's fine. He's with me."

Birkin couldn't help his dramatic entrances.

"I hope you ordered something good. Are you ready to –" He paused and looked up at the waiter. "Water please."

He produced his own Communitech and brought up a tiny document, scrolled down through it, looking at yellow-highlighted parts and pieces. "Did you get the revisions I sent you? What did you think? We have to protect the interests of the Adam League… the wording was off… I made some adjustments to the numbers as well. Can't very well have them thinking that public approval for their cause is waning…"

Wesker didn't reply.

Birkin sighed, exasperated. "Hey. Hey – where's your CT? Are you listening?"

He nodded, but his eyes were unblinking and distracted.

"Well… are you in agreement, or… I mean, did you even read my edits?"

He nodded again.

The waiter apologized for interrupting and set a plate of paper-thin red meat on the table. Carpaccio flecked with grains of sea salt.

Wesker stared at it, his fingers thrumming.

"I worked on that all afternoon –"

"Where's your wife tonight?"

The question took Birkin by surprise. He sputtered. "She's… I checked her into the Wife Room up front… Why?"

Wesker studied him. "Do you think she likes it very much in the Wife Room?"

Birkin sat back, pushing against the table. His eyebrows knitted together in concern. "I've never really questioned… She's among her peers there." He took a deep breath. "What would it matter? You know as well as I do that females don't need as much mental stimulation as men to be content."

Wesker nodded. With the closest fork, he picked at the raw flesh.

"You've had some strange preoccupations lately." Birkin looked sideways him, suspicious.

He smiled.

"You should get your head back in the game, Wesker. The re-election might be a shoo-in, but you've really got start campaigning for the election after next, and as your humble assistant and friend, I highly recommend –"

"I want to marry again."

Birkin, who had a fold of the carpaccio halfway to his plate, dropped the silverware. It clattered and pinged against the expensive ceramic dish.

"It's not a good time. You should wait. You had Seven reclaimed just last month and -"

"_And_ my bachelor status isn't good for publicity. Constituents want a married candidate – incumbent or not." Wesker argued, pointing his fork in Birkin's direction.

"_And_ they_ will_ have a married candidate… But a marriage _right now_ is not prudent." He countered.

Wesker looked away, looked out at the other people in the restaurant, enjoying their feast of flesh.

Birkin sighed. "I'm not saying that in… perhaps another six month's time, marriage is out of the question, Wesker. I'm merely suggesting that you provide the public with an appearance of grief over the end of your most recent… association."

"It's within my rights as a man to marry and allow reclamation as I see fit. The public understands this. Wives One through Seven were failures for reasons private and not private."

Birkin shook his head and took a forkful of the slippery meat. "You're impossible. I'm greying. You realize this? I'm greying over you."

Wesker smiled, charm and honesty oozing from his every pore. "Oh come on… You're a political handler; you've seen worse than me. J. Marcus was a bear, I hear."

"Marcus didn't hold a candle to your tantrums, Wesker." He chewed. "Truly. You're the worst."

And Wesker laughed.

* * *

He walked slowly to the gathering crowd.

"Fresh catch," he mouthed at Birkin.

The line-up grew - six or seven females, to twenty.

Tall and short, dark-skinned and pale-skinned, blonde and brown.

All in loose tunics and ugly slacks.

It was not a costume to entice, nor was it an outfit to tantalize, or reveal, or even mildly please the eye.

It was a future wife's attire. And wives were not to be chosen on physical merits - everyone in the New America was aware of the free-for-all marriage had become to the Sinners of the Past.

"You've had seven already, Wesker... should've just kept the last one," Birkin said.

But Wesker couldn't hear him over the rumble of the other Searching Husbands.

* * *

The auctioneer stepped up to the platform.

All of the females, most of them right out of their teens, smiled radiantly. It was the one attribute they could exploit.

Dazzling white teeth - straight and even and false.

_Veneers._

A strict diet of flesh had forced the Hand of Society to declare dental care a social obligation. And accordingly, all reputable auction houses provided extensive reparative periodontics.

Wesker waited for his turn at inspection.

His hands clasped behind his back, he walked the line.

They stood, side by side; a myriad of colors, an assortment of barely-recognizable shapes under the coarse clothing... so different and somehow the same.

He paused on one - perhaps twenty, perhaps twenty-five, perhaps twenty-seven. Hair so shockingly blonde it was like his own.

Well, not quite.

It had a sickly dishwater hue underneath.

He almost wondered if it had been dyed.

That was forbidden.

He would remind the house owner of the law later. Catering to high-piety profiles, such as himself, required that the establishment at least _try_ to cover up their illegal activities.

Wesker moved on.

A tall brunette.

Nearly eye to eye with him.

There was a roundness to her face that he immediately detested. Broad cheeks and a high forehead - a moon.

He chastised himself for the superficial knee-jerk of a reaction to the female.

But he would not have round-faced children.

The next female was an Asian - also statuesque.

If he had been accustomed to measuring a face in terms of beauty, he would have called her _exquisite_.

There was a detachment in her gaze, although the fake smile never wavered.

He snapped his fingers.

The auctioneer was at his side, rambling. "_AFS_ registered. Chinese and Irish descent. Surname Wong. Education level _R_. Described by her trainers as even-tempered and soft-spoken."

Some men would have been intimidated by such a highly educated female.

Wesker, though he felt an educated female was a waste of an education, was not threatened.

It was the mark of quality in any humanoid.

"Pedigree?" He asked.

"Thirteenth generation American. Lineage includes ten doctors, three lawyers, one physicist. Health issues relatively non-existent - though the grandfather on her maternal side succumbed to prostate cancer. Average income of immediate-family males is two-hundred and fifty thousand dollars per fiscal year."

The auctioneer answered so quickly and so firmly, it was as if he was talking about his own history.

"I'll run the chip if you don't mind." Wesker was already pulling the Communitech from his sport coat.

"Not at all, sir."

The female, still smiling - it grew wearier by the second - turned. She brushed her fringed black bob out of his way.

With the back of her neck exposed, he clicked the camera trigger and watched the screen glow as it ran her identity through The System.

* * *

_A. Wong_

_Chinese-American registered_

_Education: Q_

_Medical: none_

_Fertility: 90% success_

_Est. worth: $100,000_

* * *

He raised his eyebrows.

She was indeed a considerable match when cross-checked against his own genetic material.

"You have exaggerated her education level by a letter." Annoyance in his voice.

The auctioneer jumped. "Sir! I apologize! A grievous error. I apologize."

Wesker glanced at him - kept his expression bored and complacent. "Turn please, A. Wong."

Slowly, she met his eyes.

That same practiced stare.

A wall of a female.

He did not need another mate with secrets. He needed transparency.

Second-To-Last wife had kept secrets.

When he'd filed her back into The System, he'd checked off the _Treason_ box.

Almost reluctantly - he wasn't sure what it meant for her fate.

However, it was not simply a matter of _Irreconcilable Differences_.

On a positive note, he'd been refunded nearly sixty percent of what he'd paid for her.

As he stared at A. Wong, he felt a pang of regret... and then it settled like an uncomfortable smog on his brain.

The remnants of _guilt_.

He couldn't recall Second-To-Last's name.

No, he could not afford more guilt and most surely, A. Wong would leave him with a pile of it.

Wesker moved on and the auctioneer followed.

* * *

He'd reached the end of the line to no avail.

And none had appealed to him on any level - though quite a few were qualified for a man of his status.

"Perhaps A. Wong is deserving of a deeper background probe, sir?"

Wesker didn't reply.

Birkin sauntered over and they watched the next man in line walk the length of smiling, silent Pre-Wives.

"Nothing?" He asked when the auctioneer had his back turned.

Wesker frowned.

"The Asian?"

He frowned harder.

But thought better of it. He snapped his fingers again and the auctioneer nearly fell over himself as he rushed to them.

"Haven't you anything _not_ on the floor yet? Something... I don't know. None of these possess..." Wesker faltered. The word wouldn't come.

He wasn't even sure of what he was trying to say.

Birkin rolled his eyes.

"Possess... sir?" The auctioneer was puzzled.

"What have you got in the back?" Clipped.

"Sir... those females haven't been catalogued yet... I... By law, I cannot sell you a wife from unverified stock."

Wesker looked at Birkin and crossed his arms.

"No."

"Why not a little peek, hmm?"

"Because it's expressly prohibited! And you are a very, _very_ public figure."

Wesker looked around – Birkin's angry whispers garnering them unwanted attention. He smiled, placid, at the other patrons.

And then he grabbed Birkin's arm. "There's a female over there with dyed hair and she's wearing what I'm near certain are cosmetic enhancers. Think of the other things this house is hiding…"

"Oh, please – do not, Wesker. Do _not_ pretend this is about justice." He looked ill.

Wesker laughed, a bit too loud. "A peek."

Birkin stared at him. "You… are seriously out of control."

"It's only a preview… We're just going to windowshop, aren't we…"

* * *

After some light badgering and a promised endorsement during the campaign after next, Wesker had managed to convince the auctioneer to let them survey the stables.

And it was there, out of the glare of stage lights and garish teeth and greasy smiles, that A. Wesker found a most unlikely female.

"These females haven't been perfected, sir. They're quite rough, you see – some coming to us from other countries… some wild-caught." The auctioneer explained.

Wesker dismissed him. "I understand completely. We're only looking."

The stables were spacious but poorly lit. That air hung with humidity and the scents of bath salts and soaps and shampoos.

It was where the females were prepared for auction.

Row upon row of enormous cages, some stacked two or three high.

Females sleeping and eating and grooming as far as the eye could see.

But Wesker's eye had fallen almost immediately on one cage in particular.

"Don't get too close to that one, sir. Nasty little beast."

So Wesker stepped nearer.

Birkin shook his head, warning. "Wesker… they carry diseases."

He peered through the kennel at her.

She was young - not a day over twenty.

Slight, sharp features and wide blue eyes – eyes which did not harbor secrets but were open and strange against some world he didn't understand.

A mane of red hair was yanked out of her face, haphazard and rough, into an easy pony tail.

She leaned on the bars then, stared back at him - presumably as curious as he was.

"What the devil _is_ she?" Wesker was smiling.

Her careless appearance, her guileless eyes and almost... _dominant_ posture were all very intriguing.

"It doesn't matter what the hell she is – you're not going to marry a savage, Wesker. Talk about throwing away your lead, good gods…" Birkin was sneering.

"Just stop and think of what a marriage like this might do for my career – for _our_ career." He turned, animated. "_This_ alone could guarantee the swing votes. I marry down, purposefully, and tame her, bring her up to my status. The plebs gorge themselves on stories like that – redemption and elevation and all of that nonsense about erasing class divide."

"Have you lost your mind? She's a Sinner!" He threw his hands up.

"I haven't, and I'll prove it to you yet. The commoners will love this union. I'll seem as one of them, and that's what you've always pushed for – me, as the Every Man." He looked to the auctioneer. "How did you acquire her?"

He was terribly nervous. "She's Nomadic Sinner, sir. Arrested on The Outskirts - stealing. Unchipped. Or dechipped. We haven't deduced it yet."

Wesker's smile grew, in spite of himself. "No pedigree at all? No surname?"

"We... we aren't even sure if she's lingual, sir. She hasn't spoken a word... She's been communicating in other ways." Hesitant.

"What? What does that mean?" He turned back to the girl in the cage. "_Preposterous_... no surname..."

She smiled. Not at all the mask of the other females.

"The name's Claire Redfield, asshole," she said. "Redeem and elevate _this_."

And then she spit in his face.


End file.
